landscaping garden

Probably, summer is one of the most anticipated seasons of the year. It is the time when we could all enjoy the warm weather and feel the summer breeze kissing our cheeks. It’s the season when you could flaunt your sexy bod while you revel in the cool soothing water of the beach. You might even have already planned for a summer vacation with your friends or family, long road trips, camping or even cruising. These are indeed few of the many adventures you could enjoy during summer. Fun beckons, are you to resist? I bet, no. When fun and excitement knocks on the door, certainly we would all welcome it with our arms wide open.

Summer offers a great opportunity for all of us to revel in the beauty of the great outdoors especially in Fayetteville, Arkansas. In this city, you can enjoy the Gulley Park concert series, backpacking at the Devil’s Den State Park, attend the Fayetteville’s Farmer’s market and a whole lot more. Aside from the activities, one of the most fulfilling things we could do is to spruce up our yards. Imagine seeing your empty lawn turned into a magical and luscious landscape. However, some of us love the thought of having a landscaping project, but not too eager to start one. No worries, here’s a lazy landscaper’s guide for you to follow in sprucing up your yard this summer.

Find You Inspiration

Okay, so first, you have to find an inspiration for your landscaping. This will help you in setting up your yard and creating a plan. Inspirations can be found in landscaping brochures, magazines, catalogs, and on the internet. Or, you can even take a look around your neighborhood and maybe you can find one. You can choose more than one, pile them all up and break it down once you’re in the process of decision-making. You can carefully choose the features and flowers of each landscape that you love most. Once you have your inspiration at hand, you can already start planning and sketching a landscape design.

Go For Perennials

Plants add color and life to every landscape. However, you have to choose your plants wisely in order not to waste effort and money. Given this, native perennials are the best choice. It offers the benefit of blooming year after year and there’s no need for you to gradually pluck them out and have them replaced with new ones. Native perennials are more tolerant during droughts or water bans will also save you money in upkeep. Aside from that, they are pest resistant and have the ability to be sustain itself.

Ask Help From Local Resources

Don’t be hesitant in asking help or assistance from people around you especially from local resources that are offering it for free. County Extension agents and horticulturalists can provide you with no-obligation guidance on planting the best flowers for where you live. Plus, they can help you with your soil testing and provide you with suggestions of how to make your soil better. Local resources can also help you with your irrigation system needs and you can also check the municipal code of Fayetteville online to serve as your guidelines in landscaping.

Mow Your Lawn Appropriately

Does your grass grow too fast? If you don’t know, you have to observe it in order to determine how often you should mow your lawn. The faster your grass grows, the more often you have to mow y. It’s best to follow the one-third rule—never cutting more than one-third of the grass height. Trimming too short or mowing too often can be just as damaging as allowing grass to get too long. Make sure to use sharp blades so as to avoid damage to the turf. Remember, recycled grass clippings return organic matter and nutrients to the soil, so, you better leave it on the lawn.

Spread Mulch

Mulches prevent loss of water from the soil by evaporation and reduce the growth of weeds. It also helps retain soil moisture which is why it is important on every landscaping project. In Fayetteville, it is highly recommended to apply mulch in fall in order for your lawn to return healthy in spring. Organic mulches, such as pine bark and hardwood mulches, are highly considerable compared to inorganic mulches. In applying mulch, spread 2” – 3” of mulch per application on your landscaped beds, around your trees, underneath shrubbery, and in areas where grass doesn’t grow.

Water Efficiently

Every successful landscaping has its own efficient water or irrigation system. Before watering, watch for signs of lack of water such as dry soil or wilting. Sprinkler and drip irrigation systems are two of the mostly used water system for landscaping. In summer, your plants or your lawn will require frequent watering due to the extreme heat. It’s important that you know how much water your plants need and set an automatic timer on your irrigation systems to ensure constant watering schedules and volume as well as to avoid overwatering that can cause plants’ death.

Note:

Adding fertilizer to your lawn should only be done during fall and spring. For this, you can choose whether to use organic or commercial fertilizer. Before adding fertilizer, though, you have to do a soil test first. A soil test helps you determine the composition, pH level, and type of soil you have. It will also allow you to determine the necessary soil amendments, given that most of the soil in Arkansas, including Fayetteville, is acidic. Amendments like lime may be needed to ensure that your soil will promote plants’ growth and vitality specifically if you’re thinking of adding a vegetable garden.

In choosing your fertilizer, the more organic matter you add, the better. Hence, making your own compost bin is highly suggested. On the other hand, choosing the best commercial fertilizer depends on your soil type and type of plants. It has to contain proper ratio of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium.

Overall, landscaping in summer doesn’t really take much of your time and effort. You just have to observe the proper methods and do the tasks diligently. However, if you assess yourself and think that you really don’t have the abilities to do it on your own, then, go ahead and hire professional landscape contractors. They will help you throughout the landscaping project and will provide guaranteed results. You just have to choose the most credible and highly-experienced landscaping company.

A healthy, luscious and beautiful landscape would be the perfect view every morning you wake up and an area where you and your family could do fun stuff and hang out as you enjoy the summer heat. So, start planning yours now and make it happen before summer comes!

Having a rock garden can accent the natural beauty of any backyard. However many gardeners have a tendency to shy away from rock gardens.

Here in Las Vegas, NV it seems like every yard has palm trees and landscape rock.

This is a result of the often simplistic look of a rock garden. In actuality, rock gardens can be made into stunning, lush masterpieces. With a little research and planning, you can make an enjoyable backyard rock garden.

Get to Know Your Environment

When planning a rock garden that incorporates lush greenery, you’ll need to fully understand the limitations of your environment. This will allow you to choose plants that can thrive within your backyard. By exploring plant life by region, provided through a Quality database, you’ll know exactly what to plant and what not to plant.

Design a Landscaping Plan to Strengthen Your Natural Topography

Before choosing your first rock, you’ll need to really examine your back yard and look for naturally occurring slopes. This will allow you to determine the ideal location to build a rock garden. Rock formations within nature follow a general design, one with naturally made declines.

Once you have discovered the perfect location, you’re ready to design your rock garden. Create a plan that allows you to build a rock formation that withstands gravity. This can be done by placing rocks intelligently, so that they can stand atop one another. You should also consider the flow of your rocks. Proper flow will mimic natural rock formations. Additionally, with proper flow, you’ll have the perfect layers for plants to grow.
Building Your Rock Formation

To build a rock formation, you need to use your previously constructed plans, to ensure that you are following a logical path of rock placement. While placing your rocks, be sure to add plenty of dirt for the rocks to rest on. This will also provide your plants with a nutrient source and a path for roots to follow.
Choosing and Planting your Rock garden Vegetation

When choosing the plants that will grow in Las Vegas and within your rock garden, choose native plants that can provide natural beauty. This can be flowing succulents, a few cacti or drought resistant flowers. The individual choice, is completely up to your personal preference and can be any combination of plant types, provided that they can withstand the growing limitations of your environmental region. Simple planting considerations such as sunlight, soil composition and climate zoning is imperative to successful growth.
Incorporating the Rest of Your Backyard into Your Rock Garden

Whereas rock gardens can be designed to stand alone, bringing the rest of your backyard into your rock garden will provide you with a backyard that has a natural landscaped beauty. There are several options, providing individuality. You may choose to capitalize on the foliage that you chose or you can blend your rocks into the rest of your garden.

Creating rock lined pathways is an easy way to develop a flow to your backyard that will signify the natural aesthetics of your rock garden.

Pathways, can be intertwined to span the distance of your backyard, while also reaching points of interest.

Winding pathways towards gates, doors and seating will allow you and your guest to enjoy your backyard without interfering with plant growth.

In place of, or alongside pathways, the foliage used in your garden can be brought out into your main backyard area.

To create a cascading look, you can bring your rock garden foliage down, while intentionally planting other plant varieties. When adding other plant varieties, slowly limit the foliage within your rock garden. This process will create a natural look of plant blending found daily within nature.
Creating a Path within Your Backyard

To build a path or walkway, use standard landscape edging that can be turned effortlessly. This will allow you to wind your pathway, according to your needs. Once the edging is in place, you can fill the walkway with light gravel that has similar or neutral colors to your chosen rocks.

If you prefer to not use gravel, you can use garden pavers. The variety of available pavers provide an immense amount of opportunity to fully match your garden, and your house. Pavers are unique in that they can be placed with perfect straightness. Additionally, angled and curved pavers can also be bought alongside standard rectangular and square pavers. A nice advantage, is that pavers will allow you to create artistic mosaic style designs.

Adding Accent Lighting to Your Backyard Rock Garden

Having lighting strategically placed within your backyard can dramatically accent your rock garden, as well as the walkways that you have created. Today, the available options for outdoor lighting can cater to any landscaped design or home style. The act of installing lighting can be done easily. You may choose to have lighting professionally hardwired in or simply utilize the benefits of solar lighting.

Solar lighting, is often chosen within a backyard for it’s convenience. It’ll allow you to place lighting along walkways, and position it to bring your rock garden to life, long after the sun has set beyond the desert horizon. An advantage of any high sun area, is that solar lighting can capture a full days worth of the power of the sun. This will help to ensure that your backyard lighting can withstand even the darkest of nights.